1) What foreign Government would care what Bono has to say about Canada one way or the other.
2) The UN decision says more about the UN than it does about Canada.
3) I agree that Ignatief is hardly to blame - comment # 1 applies to him also.
4) "Principled" or not the Government's stance that our foreign policy shouldn't turn on the dubious advantage of a security council seat is the right one.
5) Whimpering? No, I think we'll get over it.

It's sad to see that the band of hicks, holy rollers and oil company execs. that presently run Canada has so diminished its international reputation. Hopefully this will make Canadians wake up and realize what their present worst-ever government is costing them.

The UN is a corrupt institution that has been hijacked by countries that need not be listed here but who everyone knows. Our country has stood by it's principles and it's friends. Nothing more needs to be said and no reasons for the government's domestic or foreign policies explained. No apologies here.

I don't think foreign policy has been a major concern of this Conservative government. If it was, and if getting a seat on the security council was a major goal, then the prime minister and foreign minister would have been travelling a lot more, been photographed often donating money to needy countries and generally kissing butt around the world. Unfortunately, being photographed donating Canadian taxpayers' money to needy countries doesn't play well with Steven Harper's base, so I think the whole endeavour of getting a seat on the Security Council was doomed from the start. If there is any blame to be assigned to anyone outside of the Conservative government, it can probably be given to the insecure minority government situation in Canada, which forces the prime minister to focus on domestic issues and watch the polls continuously, lest the government be defeated in a vote of non-confidence.

The Harper government demonstrated an astonishing lack of immaturity in laying the blame for the sad failure to obtain a seat on the UN Security Council on the few words of an opposition leader. The Harper government lost, not Canada because it was a spoiler at Copenhagen, it has turned away from Africa and moved towards focusing on business opportunities in Latin America, because it has abandoned its honest broker role in the Middle East and has lost the legacy of former Conservative and Liberal governments in the human rights and humanitarian fields that nations around the world praised Canada for. These include the Ottawa Land Mines Treaty and the International Criminal Court.